Rienzi by Edward Bulwer Lytton

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Sing, sweet subject, sing; and let it be the song our dear friend, SignorVisdomini, (I know not if this be the same Visdomini who, three yearsafterwards, with one of the Medici, conducted so gallant a reinforcement toScarperia, then besieged by Visconti d'Oleggio.) made for a kind ofinaugural anthem to such as we admitted to our court."

Mariana, who had reclined herself by the side of Adrian, took up the lute,and, after a short prelude, sung the words thus imperfectly translated: -

The Song of the Florentine Lady.

Enjoy the more the smiles of noon If doubtful be the morrow;And know the Fort of Life is soon Betray'd to Death by Sorrow!

Death claims us all - then, Grief, away! We'll own no meaner master;The clouds that darken round the day But bring the night the faster.

Love - feast - be merry while on earth, Such, Grave, should be thy moral!Ev'n Death himself is friends with Mirth, And veils the tomb with laurel. (At that time, in Italy, the laurel was frequently planted over the dead.)

While gazing on the eyes I love, New life to mine is given -If joy the lot of saints above, Joy fits us best for Heaven.

To this song, which was much applauded, succeeded those light and wittytales in which the Italian novelists furnished Voltaire and Marmontel witha model - each, in his or her turn, taking up the discourse, and with anequal dexterity avoiding every lugubrious image or mournful reflection thatmight remind those graceful idlers of the vicinity of Death. At any othertime the temper and accomplishments of the young Lord di Castello wouldhave fitted him to enjoy and to shine in that Arcadian court. But now hein vain sought to dispel the gloom from his brow, and the anxious thoughtfrom his heart. He revolved the intelligence he had received, wondered,guessed, hoped, and dreaded still; and if for a moment his mind returned tothe scene about him, his nature, too truly poetical for the false sentimentof the place, asked itself in what, save the polished exterior and thegraceful circumstance, the mirth that he now so reluctantly witnesseddiffered from the brutal revels in the convent of Santa Maria - each alikein its motive, though so differing in the manner - equally callous andequally selfish, coining horror into enjoyment. The fair Mariana, whosepartner had been reft from her, as the Queen had related, was in no mind tolose the new one she had gained. She pressed upon him from time to timethe wine-flask and the fruits; and in those unmeaning courtesies her handgently lingered upon his. At length, the hour arrived when the companionsretired to the Palace, during the fiercer heats of noon - to come forthagain in the declining sun, to sup by the side of the fountain, to dance,to sing, and to make merry by torchlight and the stars till the hour ofrest. But Adrian, not willing to continue the entertainment, no soonerfound himself in the apartment to which he was conducted, than he resolvedto effect a silent escape, as under all circumstances the shortest, and notperhaps the least courteous, farewell left to him. Accordingly, when allseemed quiet and hushed in the repose common to the inhabitants of theSouth during that hour, he left his apartment, descended the stairs, passedthe outer court, and was already at the gate, when he heard himself calledby a voice that spoke vexation and alarm. He turned to behold Mariana.

"Why, how now, Signor di Castello, is our company so unpleasing, is ourmusic so jarring, or are our brows so wrinkled, that you should fly as thetraveller flies from the witches he surprises at Benevento? Nay, youcannot mean to leave us yet?"

"Fair dame," returned the cavalier, somewhat disconcerted, "it is in vainthat I seek to rally my mournful spirits, or to fit myself for the court towhich nothing sad should come. Your laws hang about me like a culprit -better timely flight than harsh expulsion."

As he spoke he moved on, and would have passed the gate, but Mariana caughthis arm.

"Nay," said she, softly; "are there no eyes of dark light, and no neck ofwintry snow, that can compensate to thee for the absent one? Tarry andforget, as doubtless in absence even thou art forgotten!"

"Lady," answered Adrian, with great gravity, not unmixed with an ill-suppressed disdain, "I have not sojourned long enough amidst the sights andsounds of woe, to blunt my heart and spirit into callousness to all around.Enjoy, if thou canst, and gather the rank roses of the sepulchre; but tome, haunted still by funeral images, Beauty fails to bring delight, andLove, - even holy love - seems darkened by the Shadow of Death. Pardon me,and farewell."

"Go, then," said the Florentine, stung and enraged at his coldness; "go andfind your mistress amidst the associations on which it pleases yourphilosophy to dwell. I did but deceive thee, blind fool! as I had hopedfor thine own good, when I told thee Irene - (was that her name?) - wasgone from Florence. Of her I know nought, and heard nought, save fromthee. Go back and search the vault, and see whether thou lovest herstill!"

Chapter 6.IV. We Obtain What We Seek, and Know it Not.

In the fiercest heat of the day, and on foot, Adrian returned to Florence. As he approached the city, all that festive and gallant scene he hadquitted seemed to him like a dream; a vision of the gardens and bowers ofan enchantress, from which he woke abruptly as a criminal may wake on themorning of his doom to see the scaffold and the deathsman; - so much dideach silent and lonely step into the funeral city bring back his bewilderedthoughts at once to life and to death. The parting words of Marianasounded like a knell at his heart. And now as he passed on - the heat ofthe day, the lurid atmosphere, long fatigue, alternate exhaustion andexcitement, combining with the sickness of disappointment, the frettingconsciousness of precious moments irretrievably lost, and his utter despairof forming any systematic mode of search - fever began rapidly to burnthrough his veins. His temples felt oppressed as with the weight of amountain; his lips parched with intolerable thirst; his strength seemedsuddenly to desert him; and it was with pain and labour that he dragged onelanguid limb after the other.

"I feel it," thought he, with the loathing nausea and shivering dread withwhich nature struggles ever against death; "I feel it upon me - theDevouring and the Viewless - I shall perish, and without saving her; norshall even one grave contain us!"

But these thoughts served rapidly to augment the disease which began toprey upon him; and ere he reached the interior of the city, even thoughtitself forsook him. The images of men and houses grew indistinct andshadowy before his eyes; the burning pavement became unsteady and reelingbeneath his feet; delirium gathered over him, and he went on his waymuttering broken and incoherent words; the few who met fled from him indismay. Even the monks, still continuing their solemn and sad processions,passed with a murmured bene vobis to the other side from that on which hissteps swerved and faltered. And from a booth at the corner of a street,four Becchini, drinking together, fixed upon him from their black masks thegaze that vultures fix upon some dying wanderer of the desert. Still hecrept on, stretching out his arms like a man in the dark, and seeking withthe vague sense that yet struggled against the gathering delirium, to findout the mansion in which he had fixed his home; though many as fair tolive, and as meet to die in, stood with open portals before and beside hispath.

"Irene, Irene!" he cried, sometimes in a muttered and low tone, sometimesin a wild and piercing shriek, "where art thou? Where? I come to snatchthee from them; they shall not have thee, the foul and ugly fiends! Pah!how the air smells of dead flesh! Irene, Irene! we will away to mine ownpalace and the heavenly lake - Irene!"

While thus benighted, and thus exclaiming, two females suddenly emergedfrom a neighbouring house, masked and mantled.

"Vain wisdom!" said the taller and slighter of the two, whose mantle, it ishere necessary to observe, was of a deep blue, richly broidered withsilver, of a shape and a colour not common in Florence, but usual in Rome,where the dress of ladies of the higher rank was singularly bright in hueand ample in fold - thus differing from the simpler and more slenderdraperies of the Tuscan fashion - "Vain wisdom, to fly a relentless andcertain doom!"

"Why, thou wouldst not have us hold the same home with three of the dead inthe next chamber - strangers too to us - when Florence has so many emptyhalls? Trust me, we shall not walk far ere we suit ourselves with a saferlodgment."

"Hitherto, indeed, we have been miraculously preserved," sighed the other,whose voice and shape were those of extreme youth; "yet would that we knewwhere to fly - what mount, what wood, what cavern, held my brother and hisfaithful Nina! I am sick with horrors!"

"Irene, Irene! Well then, if thou art at Milan or some Lombard town, whydo I linger here? To horse, to horse! Oh, no! no! - not the horse withthe bells! not the death-cart." With a cry, a shriek, louder than theloudest of the sick man's, broke that young female away from her companion. It seemed as if a single step took her to the side of Adrian. She caughthis arm - she looked in his face - she met his unconscious eyes bright witha fearful fire. "It has seized him!" - (she then said in a deep but calmtone) - "the Plague!"

"Help me to bear him somewhere, see, he faints, he droops, he falls! - helpme, dear Signora, for pity, for the love of God!"

But, wholly possessed by the selfish fear which overcame all humanity inthat miserable time, the elder woman, though naturally kind, pitiful, andbenevolent, fled rapidly away, and soon vanished. Thus left alone withAdrian, who had now, in the fierceness of the fever that preyed within him,fallen on the ground, the strength and nerve of that young girl did notforsake her. She tore off the heavy mantle which encumbered her arms, andcast it from her; and then, lifting up the face of her lover - for who butIrene was that weak woman, thus shrinking not from the contagion of death?- she supported him on her breast, and called aloud and again for help. Atlength the Becchini, in the booth before noticed, (hardened in theirprofession, and who, thus hardened, better than the most cautious, escapedthe pestilence,) lazily approached - "Quicker, quicker, for Christ's love!"said Irene. "I have much gold; I will reward you well: help me to bearhim under the nearest roof."

"Leave him to us, young lady: we have had our eye upon him," said one ofthe gravediggers. "We'll do our duty by him, first and last."

"No - no! touch not his head - that is my care. There, I will help you;so, - now then, - but be gentle!"

Assisted by these portentous officers, Irene, who would not release herhold, but seemed to watch over the beloved eyes and lips, (set and closedas they were,) as if to look back the soul from parting, bore Adrian into aneighbouring house, and laid him on a bed; from which Irene (preserving asonly women do, in such times, the presence of mind and vigilant providencewhich make so sublime a contrast with their keen susceptibilities) causedthem first to cast off the draperies and clothing, which might retainadditional infection. She then despatched them for new furniture, and forwhatsoever leech money might yet bribe to a duty, now chiefly abandoned tothose heroic Brotherhoods who, however vilified in modern judgment by thecrimes of some unworthy members, were yet, in the dark times, the best, thebravest, and the holiest agents, to whom God ever delegated the power toresist the oppressor - to feed the hungry - to minister to woe; and who,alone, amidst that fiery Pestilence, (loosed, as it were, a demon from theabyss, to shiver into atoms all that binds the world to Virtue and to Law,)seemed to awaken, as by the sound of an angel's trumpet, to that noblestChivalry of the Cross - whose faith is the scorn of self - whose hope isbeyond the Lazar-house - whose feet, already winded for immortality,trample, with a conqueror's march, upon the graves of Death!

While this the ministry and the office of love, - along that street inwhich Adrian and Irene had met at last - came singing, reeling, roaring,the dissolute and abandoned crew who had fixed their quarters in theConvent of Santa Maria de' Pazzi, their bravo chief at their head, and anun (no longer in nun's garments) upon either arm. "A health to thePlague!" shouted the ruffian: "A health to the Plague!" echoed his franticBacchanals.

"A health to the Plague, may she ever, as now, Loose the rogue from his chain, and the nun from her vow; To the gaoler a sword - to the captive a key, Hurrah for Earth's Curse! 'tis a blessing to me."

"Holla!" cried the chief, stopping; "here, Margherita; here's a brave cloakfor thee, my girl: silver enow on it to fill thy purse, if it ever growempty; which it may, if ever the Plague grow slack."

"Nay," said the girl, who, amidst all the havoc of debauch, retained muchof youth and beauty in her form and face; nay, Guidotto; perhaps it hasinfection."

"Pooh, child, silver never infects. Clap it on, clap it on. Besides, fateis fate, and when it is thine hour there will be other means besides thegavocciolo."

So saying, he seized the mantle, threw it roughly over her shoulders, anddragged her on as before, half pleased with the finery, half frightenedwith the danger; while gradually died away, along the lurid air and themournful streets, the chant of that most miserable mirth.

Chapter 6.V. The Error.

For three days, the fatal three days, did Adrian remain bereft of strengthand sense. But he was not smitten by the scourge which his devoted andgenerous nurse had anticipated. It was a fierce and dangerous fever,brought on by the great fatigue, restlessness, and terrible agitation hehad undergone.

No professional mediciner could be found to attend him; but a good friar,better perhaps skilled in the healing art than many who claimed itsmonopoly, visited him daily. And in the long and frequent absences towhich his other and numerous duties compelled the monk, there was one everat hand to smooth the pillow, to wipe the brow, to listen to the moan, towatch the sleep. And even in that dismal office, when, in the frenzy ofthe sufferer, her name, coupled with terms of passionate endearment, brokefrom his lips, a thrill of strange pleasure crossed the heart of thebetrothed, which she chid as if it were a crime. But even the mostunearthly love is selfish in the rapture of being loved! Words cannottell, heart cannot divine, the mingled emotions that broke over her when,in some of these incoherent ravings, she dimly understood that for her thecity had been sought, the death dared, the danger incurred. And as thenbending passionately to kiss that burning brow, her tears fell fast overthe idol of her youth, the fountains from which they gushed were those,fathomless and countless, which a life could not weep away. Not an impulseof the human and the woman heart that was not stirred; the adoringgratitude, the meek wonder thus to be loved, while deeming it so simple amerit thus to love; - as if all sacrifice in her were a thing of course, -to her, a virtue nature could not paragon, worlds could not repay! Andthere he lay, the victim to his own fearless faith, helpless - dependentupon her - a thing between life and death, to thank, to serve - to be proudof, yet protect, to compassionate, yet revere - the saver, to be saved! Never seemed one object to demand at once from a single heart so many andso profound emotions; the romantic enthusiasm of the girl - the fondidolatry of the bride - the watchful providence of the mother over herchild.

And strange to say, with all the excitement of that lonely watch, scarcelystirring from his side, taking food only that her strength might not failher, - unable to close her eyes, - though, from the same cause, she wouldfain have taken rest, when slumber fell upon her charge - with all suchwear and tear of frame and heart, she seemed wonderfully supported. Andthe holy man marvelled, in each visit, to see the cheek of the nurse stillfresh, and her eye still bright. In her own superstition she thought andfelt that Heaven gifted her with a preternatural power to be true to sosacred a charge; and in this fancy she did not wholly err: - for Heaven didgift her with that diviner power, when it planted in so soft a heart theenduring might and energy of Affection! The friar had visited the sick manlate on the third night, and administered to him a strong sedative. "Thisnight," said he to Irene, "will be the crisis: should he awaken, as Itrust he may, with a returning consciousness, and a calm pulse, he willlive; if not, young daughter, prepare for the worst. But should you noteany turn in the disease, that may excite alarm, or require my attendance,this scroll will inform you where I am, if God spare me still, at each hourof the night and morning."

The monk retired, and Irene resumed her watch.

The sleep of Adrian was at first broken and interrupted - his features, hisexclamations, his gestures, all evinced great agony, whether mental orbodily: it seemed, as perhaps it was, a fierce and doubtful strugglebetween life and death for the conquest of the sleeper. Patient, silent,breathing but by long-drawn gasps, Irene sate at the bed-head. The lampwas removed to the further end of the chamber, and its ray, shaded by thedraperies, did not suffice to give to her gaze more than the outline of thecountenance she watched. In that awful suspense, all the thoughts thathitherto had stirred her mind lay hushed and mute. She was only sensibleto that unutterable fear which few of us have been happy enough not toknow. That crushing weight under which we can scarcely breathe or move,the avalanche over us, freezing and suspended, which we cannot escape from,beneath which, every moment, we may be buried and overwhelmed. The wholedestiny of life was in the chances of that single night! It was just asAdrian at last seemed to glide into a deeper and serener slumber, that thebells of the death-cart broke with their boding knell the palpable silenceof the streets. Now hushed, now revived, as the cart stopped for itsgloomy passengers, and coming nearer and nearer after every pause. Atlength she heard the heavy wheels stop under the very casement, and a voicedeep and muffled calling aloud, "Bring out the dead!" She rose, and with anoiseless step, passed to secure the door, when the dull lamp gleamed uponthe dark and shrouded forms of the Becchini.

"You have not marked the door, nor set out the body," said one gruffly;"but this is the third night! He is ready for us."

"Hush, he sleeps - away, quick, it is not the Plague that seized him."

"Not the Plague?" growled the Becchino in a disappointed tone; "I thoughtno other illness dared encroach upon the rights of the gavocciolo!"

"Go - here's money; leave us."

And the grisly carrier sullenly withdrew. The cart moved on, the bellrenewed its summons, till slowly and faintly the dreadful larum died in thedistance.

Shading the lamp with her hand, Irene stole to the bed side, fearful thatthe sound and the intrusion had disturbed the slumberer. But his face wasstill locked, as in a vice, with that iron sleep. He stirred not - thebreath scarcely passed his lips - she felt his pulse, as the wan hand layon the coverlid - there was a slight beat - she was contented - removed thelight, and, retiring to a corner of the room, placed the little crosssuspended round her neck upon the table, and prayed, in her intensesuffering, to Him who had known death, and who - Son of Heaven though hewas, and Sovereign of the Seraphim - had also prayed, in his earthlytravail, that the cup might pass away.

The Morning broke, not, as in the North, slowly and through shadow, butwith the sudden glory with which in those climates Day leaps upon earth -like a giant from his sleep. A sudden smile - a burnished glow - and nighthad vanished. Adrian still slept; not a muscle seemed to have stirred; thesleep was even heavier than before; the silence became a burthen upon theair. Now, in that exceeding torpor so like unto death, the solitarywatcher became alarmed and terrified. Time passed - morning glided to noon- still not a sound nor motion. The sun was midway in Heaven - the Friarcame not. And now again touching Adrian's pulse, she felt no flutter - shegazed on him, appalled and confounded; surely nought living could be sostill and pale. "Was it indeed sleep, might it not be - " She turnedaway, sick and frozen; her tongue clove to her lips. Why did the fathertarry? - she would go to him - she would learn the worst - she couldforbear no longer. She glanced over the scroll the Monk had left her: "From sunrise," it said, "I shall be at the Convent of the Dominicans. Death has stricken many of the brethren." The Convent was at somedistance, but she knew the spot, and fear would wing her steps. She gaveone wistful look at the sleeper and rushed from the house. "I shall seethee again presently," she murmured. Alas! what hope can calculate beyondthe moment? And who shall claim the tenure of 'The Again?'

It was not many minutes after Irene had left the room, ere, with a longsigh, Adrian opened his eyes - an altered and another man; the fever wasgone, the reviving pulse beat low indeed, but calm. His mind was once moremaster of his body, and, though weak and feeble, the danger was past, andlife and intellect regained.

"I have slept long," he muttered; "and oh, such dreams! And methought Isaw Irene, but could not speak to her, and while I attempted to grasp her,her face changed, her form dilated, and I was in the clutch of the foulgravedigger. It is late - the sun is high - I must be up and stirring. Irene is in Lombardy. No, no; that was a lie, a wicked lie; she is atFlorence, I must renew my search."

As this duty came to his remembrance, he rose from the bed - he was amazedat his own debility: at first he could not stand without support from thewall; by degrees, however, he so far regained the mastery of his limbs asto walk, though with effort and pain. A ravening hunger preyed upon him,he found some scanty and light food in the chamber, which he devouredeagerly. And with scarce less eagerness laved his enfeebled form andhaggard face with the water that stood at hand. He now felt refreshed andinvigorated, and began to indue his garments, which he found thrown on aheap beside the bed. He gazed with surprise and a kind of self-compassionupon his emaciated hands and shrunken limbs, and began now to comprehendthat he must have had some severe but unconscious illness. "Alone, too,"thought he; "no one near to tend me! Nature my only nurse! But alas!alas! how long a time may thus have been wasted, and my adored Irene -quick, quick, not a moment more will I lose."

He soon found himself in the open street; the air revived him; and thatmorning had sprung up the blessed breeze, the first known for weeks. Hewandered on very slowly and feebly till he came to a broad square, fromwhich, in the vista, might be seen one of the principal gates of Florence,and the fig-trees and olive-groves beyond, it was then that a Pilgrim oftall stature approached towards him as from the gate; his hood was thrownback, and gave to view a countenance of great but sad command; a face, inwhose high features, massive brow, and proud, unshrinking gaze, shaded byan expression of melancholy more stern than soft, Nature seemed to havewritten majesty, and Fate disaster. As in that silent and dreary place,these two, the only tenants of the street, now encountered, Adrian stoppedabruptly, and said in a startled and doubting voice: "Do I dream still, ordo I behold Rienzi?"

The Pilgrim paused also, as he heard the name, and gazing long on theattenuated features of the young lord, said: I am he that was Rienzi! andyou, pale shadow, is it in this grave of Italy that I meet with the gay andhigh Colonna? Alas, young friend," he added, in a more relaxed and kindlyvoice, "hath the Plague not spared the flower of the Roman nobles? Come,I, the cruel and the harsh Tribune, I will be thy nurse: he who might havebeen my brother, shall yet claim from me a brother's care."

With these words he wound his arm tenderly round Adrian; and the youngnoble, touched by his compassion, and agitated by the surprise, leaned uponRienzi's breast in silence.

"Poor youth," resumed the Tribune, for so, since rather fallen thandeposed, he may yet be called; "I ever loved the young, (my brother diedyoung;) and you more than most. What fatality brought thee hither?"

"Irene!" replied Adrian, falteringly.

"Is it so, really? Art thou a Colonna, and yet prize the fallen? The sameduty has brought me also to the city of Death. From the furthest south -over the mountains of the robber - through the fastnesses of my foes -through towns in which the herald proclaimed in my ear the price of my head- I have passed hither, on foot and alone, safe under the wings of theAlmighty One. Young man, thou shouldst have left this task to one whobears a wizard's life, and whom Heaven and Earth yet reserve for anappointed end!"

The Tribune said this in a deep and inward voice; and in his raised eye andsolemn brow might be seen how much his reverses had deepened hisfanaticism, and added even to the sanguineness of his hopes.

"But," asked Adrian, withdrawing gently from Rienzi's arm, "thou knowest,then, where Irene is to be found; let us go together. Lose not a moment inthis talk; time is of inestimable value, and a moment in this city is oftenbut the border to eternity."

"Right," said Rienzi, awakening to his object. "But fear not, I havedreamt that I shall save her, the gem and darling of my house. Fear not, Ihave no fear."

"Know you where to seek?" said Adrian, impatiently; "the Convent holds farother guests."

"Ha! so said my dream!"

"Talk not now of dreams," said the lover; "but if you have no other guide,let us part at once in quest of her. I will take yonder street, you takethe opposite, and at sunset let us meet in the same spot."

"Rash man!" said the Tribune, with great solemnity; "scoff not at thevisions which Heaven makes a parable to its Chosen. Thou seekest counselof thy human wisdom; I, less presumptuous, follow the hand of themysterious Providence, moving even now before my gaze as a pillar of lightthrough the wilderness of dread. Ay, meet we here at sunset, and provewhose guide is the most unerring. If my dream tell me true, I shall see mysister living, ere the sun reach yonder hill, and by a church dedicated toSt. Mark."

The grave earnestness with which Rienzi spoke impressed Adrian with a hopewhich his reason would not acknowledge. He saw him depart with that proudand stately step to which his sweeping garments gave a yet more imposingdignity, and then passed up the street to the right hand. He had not gothalf way when he felt himself pulled by the mantle. He turned, and saw theshapeless mask of a Becchino.

"I feared you were sped, and that another had cheated me of my office,"said the gravedigger, "seeing that you returned not to the old Prince'spalace. You don't know me from the rest of us I see, but I am the one youtold to seek - "

"Irene!"

"Yes, Irene di Gabrini; you promised ample reward."

"You shall have it."

"Follow me."

The Becchino strode on, and soon arrived at a mansion. He knocked twice atthe porter's entrance, an old woman cautiously opened the door. "Fear not,good aunt," said the gravedigger; "this is the young Lord I spoke to theeof. Thou sayest thou hadst two ladies in the palace, who alone survived ofall the lodgers, and their names were Bianca de Medici, and - what was theother?"

"Irene di Gabrini, a Roman lady. But I told thee this was the fourth daythey left the house, terrified by the deaths within it."

"Thou didst so: and was there anything remarkable in the dress of theSignora di Gabrini?"

"Yes, I have told thee: a blue mantle, such as I have rarely seen, wroughtwith silver."

"Was the broidery that of stars, silver stars," exclaimed Adrian, "with asun in the centre?"

"It was."

"Alas! alas! the arms of the Tribune's family! I remember how I praisedthe mantle the first day she wore it - the day on which we were betrothed!" And the lover at once conjectured the secret sentiment which had inducedIrene to retain thus carefully a robe so endeared by association.

"You know no more of your lodgers?"

"Nothing."

"And is this all you have learned, knave?" cried Adrian.

"Patience. I must bring you from proof to proof, and link to link, inorder to win my reward. Follow, Signor."

The Becchino then passing through the several lanes and streets, arrived atanother house of less magnificent size and architecture. Again he tappedthrice at the parlour door, and this time came forth a man withered, old,and palsied, whom death seemed to disdain to strike.

"Signor Astuccio," said the Becchino, "pardon me; but I told thee I mighttrouble thee again. This is the gentleman who wants to know, what is oftenbest unknown - but that's not my affair. Did a lady - young and beautiful- with dark hair, and of a slender form, enter this house, stricken withthe first symptom of the Plague, three days since?"

"Ay, thou knowest that well enough; and thou knowest still better, that shehas departed these two days: it was quick work with her, quicker than withmost!"

"Did she wear anything remarkable?"

"Yes, troublesome man: a blue cloak, with stars of silver."

"Couldst thou guess aught of her previous circumstances?"

"No, save that she raved much about the nunnery of Santa Maria de' Pazzi,and bravos, and sacrilege."

"Are you satisfied, Signor?" asked the gravedigger, with an air of triumph,turning to Adrian. "But no, I will satisfy thee better, if thou hastcourage. Wilt thou follow?"

"I comprehend thee; lead on. Courage! What is there on earth now tofear?"

Muttering to himself, "Ay, leave me alone. I have a head worth something;I ask no gentleman to go by my word; I will make his own eyes the judge ofwhat my trouble is worth," the gravedigger now led the way through one ofthe gates a little out of the city. And here, under a shed, sat six of hisghastly and ill-omened brethren, with spades and pick-axes at their feet.

His guide now turned round to Adrian, whose face was set, and resolute indespair.

"Fair Signor," said he, with some touch of lingering compassion, "wouldstthou really convince thine own eyes and heart? - the sight may appal, thecontagion may destroy, thee, - if, indeed, as it seems to me, Death has notalready written 'mine' upon thee."

"Raven of bode and woe!" answered Adrian, "seest thou not that all I shrinkfrom is thy voice and aspect? Show me her I seek, living or dead."

"I will show her to you, then," said the Becchino, sullenly, "such as twonights since she was committed to my charge. Line and lineament mayalready be swept away, for the Plague hath a rapid besom; but I have leftthat upon her by which you will know the Becchino is no liar. Bring hitherthe torches, comrades, and lift the door. Never stare; it's thegentleman's whim, and he'll pay it well."

Turning to the right while Adrian mechanically followed his conductors, aspectacle whose dire philosophy crushes as with a wheel all the pride ofmortal man - the spectacle of that vault in which earth hides all that onearth flourished, rejoiced, exulted - awaited his eye!

The Becchini lifted a ponderous grate, lowered their torches (scarcelyneeded, for through the aperture rushed, with a hideous glare, the light ofthe burning sun,) and motioned to Adrian to advance. He stood upon thesummit of the abyss and gazed below.

It was a large deep and circular space, like the bottom of an exhaustedwell. In niches cut into the walls of earth around, lay, duly coffined,those who had been the earliest victims of the plague, when the Becchino'smarket was not yet glutted, and priest followed, and friend mourned thedead. But on the floor below, there was the loathsome horror! Huddled andmatted together - some naked, some in shrouds already black and rotten -lay the later guests, the unshriven and unblest! The torches, the sun,streamed broad and red over Corruption in all its stages, from the paleblue tint and swollen shape, to the moistened undistinguishable mass, orthe riddled bones, where yet clung, in strips and tatters, the black andmangled flesh. In many, the face remained almost perfect, while the restof the body was but bone; the long hair, the human face, surmounting thegrisly skeleton. There was the infant, still on the mother's breast; therewas the lover, stretched across the dainty limbs of his adored! The rats,(for they clustered in numbers to that feast,) disturbed, not scared, sateup from their horrid meal as the light glimmered over them, and thousandsof them lay round, stark, and dead, poisoned by that they fed on! There,too, the wild satire of the gravediggers had cast, though stripped of theirgold and jewels, the emblems that spoke of departed rank; - the broken wandof the Councillor; the General's baton; the Priestly Mitre! The foul andlivid exhalations gathered like flesh itself, fungous and putrid, upon thewalls, and the -

But who shall detail the ineffable and unimaginable horrors that reignedover the Palace where the Great King received the prisoners whom the swordof the Pestilence had subdued?

But through all that crowded court - crowded with beauty and with birth,with the strength of the young and the honours of the old, and the valourof the brave, and the wisdom of the learned, and the wit of the scorner,and the piety of the faithful - one only figure attracted Adrian's eye. Apart from the rest, a latecomer - the long locks streaming far and darkover arm and breast - lay a female, the face turned partially aside, thelittle seen not recognisable even by the mother of the dead, - but wrappedround in that fatal mantle, on which, though blackened and tarnished, wasyet visible the starry heraldry assumed by those who claimed the name ofthe proud Tribune of Rome. Adrian saw no more - he fell back in the armsof the gravediggers: when he recovered, he was still without the gates ofFlorence - reclined upon a green mound - his guide stood beside him -holding his steed by the bridle as it grazed patiently on the neglectedgrass. The other brethren of the axe had resumed their seat under theshed.

"So, you have revived! Ah! I thought it was only the effluvia; few standit as we do. And so, as your search is over, deeming you would now bequitting Florence if you have any sense left to you, I went for your goodhorse. I have fed him since your departure from the palace. Indeed Ifancied he would be my perquisite, but there are plenty as good. Come,young sir, mount. I feel a pity for you, I know not why, except that youare the only one I have met for weeks who seem to care for another morethan for yourself. I hope you are satisfied now that I showed some brains,eh! in your service; and as I have kept my promise, you'll keep yours."

"Take yon - yon clay from that fearful place. Inter it in some quiet andremote spot - apart - alone! You promise me? - you swear it? - it is well! And now help me on my horse. Farewell Italy, and if I die not with thisstroke, may I die as befits at once honour and despair - with trumpet andbanner round me - in a well-fought field against a worthy foe! - Save aknightly death, nothing is left to live for!"

"He was immured in a high and spacious tower; he had books enough, hisTitus Livius, his histories of Rome, the Bible," &c.

Chapter 7.I. Avignon. - The Two Pages. - The Stranger Beauty.

There is this difference between the Drama of Shakspeare, and that ofalmost every other master of the same art; that in the first, thecatastrophe is rarely produced by one single cause - one simple andcontinuous chain of events. Various and complicated agencies work out thefinal end. Unfettered by the rules of time and place, each time, eachplace depicted, presents us with its appropriate change of action, or ofactors. Sometimes the interest seems to halt, to turn aside, to bring usunawares upon objects hitherto unnoticed, or upon qualities of thecharacters hitherto hinted at, not developed. But, in reality, the pausein the action is but to collect, to gather up, and to grasp, all thevarieties of circumstance that conduce to the Great Result: and the art offiction is only deserted for the fidelity of history. Whoever seeks toplace before the world the true representation of a man's life and times,and, enlarging the Dramatic into the Epic, extends his narrative over thevicissitudes of years, will find himself unconsciously, in this, theimitator of Shakspeare. New characters, each conducive to the end - newscenes, each leading to the last, rise before him as he proceeds, sometimesseeming to the reader to delay, even while they advance, the dreadcatastrophe. The sacrificial procession sweeps along, swelled by newcomers, losing many that first joined it; before, at last, the same as awhole, but differing in its components, the crowd reach the fated bourn ofthe Altar and the Victim!

It is five years after the date of the events I have recorded, and my storyconveys us to the Papal Court at Avignon - that tranquil seat of power, towhich the successors of St. Peter had transplanted the luxury, the pomp,and the vices, of the Imperial City. Secure from the fraud or violence ofa powerful and barbarous nobility, the courtiers of the See surrenderedthemselves to a holyday of delight - their repose was devoted to enjoyment,and Avignon presented, at that day, perhaps the gayest and most voluptuoussociety of Europe. The elegance of Clement VI. had diffused an air ofliterary refinement over the grosser pleasures of the place, and the spiritof Petrarch still continued to work its way through the councils of factionand the orgies of debauch.

Innocent VI. had lately succeeded Clement, and whatever his own claims tolearning, (Matteo Villani (lib. iii. cap. 44) says, that Innocent VI. hadnot much pretension to learning. He is reported, however, by otherauthorities, cited by Zefirino Re, to have been "eccellente canonista." Hehad been a professor in the University of Toulouse.) he, at least,appreciated knowledge and intellect in others; so that the gracefulpedantry of the time continued to mix itself with the pursuit of pleasure. The corruption which reigned through the whole place was too confirmed toyield to the example of Innocent, himself a man of simple habits andexemplary life. Though, like his predecessor, obedient to the policy ofFrance, Innocent possessed a hard and an extended ambition. Deeplyconcerned for the interests of the Church, he formed the project ofconfirming and re-establishing her shaken dominion in Italy; and heregarded the tyrants of the various states as the principal obstacles tohis ecclesiastical ambition. Nor was this the policy of Innocent VI.alone. With such exceptions as peculiar circumstances necessarilyoccasioned, the Papal See was, upon the whole, friendly to the politicalliberties of Italy. The Republics of the Middle Ages grew up under theshadow of the Church; and there, as elsewhere, it was found, contrary to avulgar opinion, that Religion, however prostituted and perverted, servedfor the general protection of civil freedom, - raised the lowly, andresisted the oppressor.

At this period there appeared at Avignon a lady of singular and matchlessbeauty. She had come with a slender but well appointed retinue fromFlorence, but declared herself of Neapolitan birth; the widow of a noble ofthe brilliant court of the unfortunate Jane. Her name was Cesarini. Arrived at a place where, even in the citadel of Christianity, Venusretained her ancient empire, where Love made the prime business of life,and to be beautiful was to be of power; the Signora Cesarini had scarcelyappeared in public before she saw at her feet half the rank and gallantryof Avignon. Her female attendants were beset with bribes and billets; andnightly, beneath her lattice, was heard the plaintive serenade. Sheentered largely into the gay dissipation of the town, and her charms sharedthe celebrity of the hour with the verse of Petrarch. But though shefrowned on none, none could claim the monopoly of her smiles. Her fairfame was as yet unblemished; but if any might presume beyond the rest, sheseemed to have selected rather from ambition than love, and Giles, thewarlike Cardinal d'Albornoz, all powerful at the sacred court, alreadyforeboded the hour of his triumph.

It was late noon, and in the ante-chamber of the fair Signora waited two ofthat fraternity of pages, fair and richly clad, who, at that day, furnishedthe favourite attendants to rank of either sex.

"By my troth," cried one of these young servitors, pushing from him thedice with which himself and his companion had sought to beguile theirleisure, "this is but dull work! and the best part of the day is gone. Ourlady is late."

"And I have donned my new velvet mantle," replied the other,compassionately eyeing his finery.

"Chut, Giacomo," said his comrade, yawning; "a truce with thy conceit. -What news abroad, I wonder? Has his Holiness come to his senses yet?"

"I think he is; if, being Pope, he does not discover that he may at lengthlay aside mask and hood. 'Continent Cardinal - lewd Pope,' is the oldmotto, you know; something must be the matter with the good man's brain ifhe continue to live like a hermit."

"Oh, I have you! but faith, his Holiness has proxies eno'. The bishopstake care to prevent women, Heaven bless them! going out of fashion; andAlbornoz does not maintain your proverb, touching the Cardinals."

"True, but Giles is a warrior, - a cardinal in the church, but a soldier inthe city."

"Will he carry the fort here, think you, Angelo?"

"Why, fort is female, but - "

"But what?"

"The Signora's brow is made for power, rather than love, fair as it is. She sees in Albornoz the prince, and not the lover. With what a step shesweeps the floor! it disdains even the cloth of gold!"

"Hark!" cried Giacomo, hastening to the lattice, "hear you the hoofs below? Ah, a gallant company!"

"Returned from hawking," answered Angelo, regarding wistfully thecavalcade, as it swept the narrow street. "Plumes waving, steedscurvetting - see how yon handsome cavalier presses close to that dame!"

"His mantle is the colour of mine," sighed Giacomo.

As the gay procession paced slowly on, till hidden by the winding street,and as the sound of laughter and the tramp of horses was yet faintly heard,there frowned right before the straining gaze of the pages, a dark massivetower of the mighty masonry of the eleventh century: the sun gleamed sadlyon its vast and dismal surface, which was only here and there relieved byloopholes and narrow slits, rather than casements. It was a strikingcontrast to the gaiety around, the glittering shops, and the gaudy trainthat had just filled the space below. This contrast the young men seemedinvoluntarily to feel; they drew back, and looked at each other.

"And I thank my stars that made me not high enough to require so grand acage," rejoined Giacomo.

"Yet," observed Angelo, "it holds one, who in birth was not our superior."

"Do tell me something of that strange man," said Giacomo, regaining hisseat; "you are Roman and should know."

"Yes!" answered Angelo, haughtily drawing himself up, "I am Roman! and Ishould be unworthy my birth, if I had not already learned what honour isdue to the name of Cola di Rienzi."

"Yet your fellow-Romans merely stoned him, I fancy," muttered Giacomo. "Honour seems to lie more in kicks than money. Can you tell me," continuedthe page in a louder key, "can you tell me if it be true, that Rienziappeared at Prague before the Emperor, and prophesied that the late Popeand all the Cardinals should be murdered, and a new Italian Pope elected,who should endue the Emperor with a golden crown, as Sovereign of Sicilia,Calabria, and Apulia, (An absurd fable, adopted by certain historians.) andhimself with a crown of silver, as King of Rome, and all Italy? And - "

"Hush!" interrupted Angelo, impatiently. "Listen to me, and you shall knowthe exact story. On last leaving Rome (thou knowest that, after his fall,he was present at the Jubilee in disguise) the Tribune - " here Angelo,pausing, looked round, and then with a flushed cheek and raised voiceresumed, "Yes, the Tribune, that was and shall be - travelled in disguise,as a pilgrim, over mountain and forest, night and day, exposed to rain andstorm, no shelter but the cave, - he who had been, they say, the veryspoilt one of Luxury. Arrived at length in Bohemia, he disclosed himselfto a Florentine in Prague, and through his aid obtained audience of theEmperor Charles."

"A prudent man, the Emperor!" said Giacomo, "close-fisted as a miser. Hemakes conquests by bargain, and goes to market for laurels, - as I haveheard my brother say, who was under him."

"True; but I have also heard that he likes bookmen and scholars - is wiseand temperate, and much is yet hoped from him in Italy! Before theEmperor, I say, came Rienzi. 'Know, great Prince,' said he, 'that I amthat Rienzi to whom God gave to govern Rome, in peace, with justice, and tofreedom. I curbed the nobles, I purged corruption, I amended law. Thepowerful persecuted me - pride and envy have chased me from my dominions. Great as you are, fallen as I am, I too have wielded the sceptre and mighthave worn a crown. Know, too, that I am illegitimately of your lineage; myfather the son of Henry VII.; (Uncle to the Emperor Charles.) the blood ofthe Teuton rolls in my veins; mean as were my earlier fortunes and humblemy earlier name! From you, O King, I seek protection, and I demandjustice." (See, for this speech, "the Anonymous Biographer," lib. ii. cap.12.)

"A bold speech, and one from equal to equal," said Giacomo; "surely youswell us out the words."

"Not a whit; they were written down by the Emperor's scribe, and everyRoman who has once heard knows them by heart: once every Roman was theequal to a king, and Rienzi maintained our dignity in asserting his own."

Giacomo, who discreetly avoided quarrels, knew the weak side of his friend;and though in his heart he thought the Romans as good-for-nothing a set ofturbulent dastards as all Italy might furnish, he merely picked a strawfrom his mantle, and said, in rather an impatient tone, "Humph! proceed!did the Emperor dismiss him?"

"Not so: Charles was struck with his bearing and his spirit, received himgraciously, and entertained him hospitably. He remained some time atPrague, and astonished all the learned with his knowledge and eloquence." (His Italian contemporary delights in representing this remarkable man asanother Crichton. "Disputava," he says of him when at Prague, "disputavacon Mastri di teologia; molto diceva, parlava cose meravigliose...abbairfea ogni persona." - "He disputed with Masters of theology - he spoke much,he discoursed things wonderful - he astonished every one.")

"But if so honoured at Prague, how comes he a prisoner at Avignon?"

"Giacomo," said Angelo, thoughtfully, "there are some men whom we, ofanother mind and mould, can rarely comprehend, and never fathom. And ofsuch men I have observed that a supreme confidence in their own fortunes ortheir own souls, is the most common feature. Thus impressed, and thusbuoyed, they rush into danger with a seeming madness, and from danger soarto greatness, or sink to death. So with Rienzi; dissatisfied with emptycourtesies and weary of playing the pedant, since once he had played theprince; - some say of his own accord, (though others relate that he wassurrendered to the Pope's legate by Charles,) he left the Emperor's court,and without arms, without money, betook himself at once to Avignon!"

"Madness indeed!"

"Yet, perhaps his only course, under all circumstances," resumed the elderpage. "Once before his fall, and once during his absence from Rome, he hadbeen excommunicated by the Pope's legate. He was accused of heresy - theban was still on him. It was necessary that he should clear himself. Howwas the poor exile to do so? No powerful friend stood up for the friend ofthe people. No courtier vindicated one who had trampled on the neck of thenobles. His own genius was his only friend; on that only could he rely. He sought Avignon, to free himself from the accusations against him; and,doubtless, he hoped that there was but one step from his acquittal to hisrestoration. Besides, it is certain that the Emperor had been applied to,formally to surrender Rienzi. He had the choice before him; for to thatsooner or later it must come - to go free, or to go in bonds - as acriminal, or as a Roman. He chose the latter. Wherever he passed along,the people rose in every town, in every hamlet. The name of the greatTribune was honoured throughout all Italy. They besought him not to rushinto the very den of peril - they implored him to save himself for thatcountry which he had sought to raise. 'I go to vindicate myself, and totriumph,' was the Tribune's answer. Solemn honours were paid him in thecities through which he passed; ("Per tutto la via li furo fatti solennionori," &c. - "Vita di Cola di Rienzi", lib. ii. cap. 13.) and I am toldthat never ambassador, prince, or baron, entered Avignon with so long atrain as that which followed into these very walls the steps of Cola diRienzi."

"And on his arrival?"

"He demanded an audience, that he might refute the charges against him. Heflung down the gage to the proud cardinals who had excommunicated him. Hebesought a trial."

"And what said the Pope?"

"Nothing - by word. Yon tower was his answer!"

"A rough one!"

"But there have been longer roads than that from the prison to the palace,and God made not men like Rienzi for the dungeon and the chain."

As Angelo said this with a loud voice, and with all the enthusiasm withwhich the fame of the fallen Tribune had inspired the youth of Rome, heheard a sigh behind him. He turned in some confusion, and at the doorwhich admitted to the chamber occupied by the Signora Cesarini, stood afemale of noble presence. Attired in the richest garments, gold and gemswere dull to the lustre of her dark eyes, and as she now stood, erect andcommanding, never seemed brow more made for the regal crown - never didhuman beauty more fully consummate the ideal of a heroine and a queen.

"Rienzi!" said the lady, approaching; "a fit one to stir a Roman heart. Nay - no excuses: they would sound ill on thy generous lips. Ah, if - "the Signora paused suddenly, and sighed again; then in an altered andgraver tone she resumed - "If fate restore Rienzi to his proper fortunes,he shall know what thou deemest of him."

"If you, lady, who are of Naples," said Angelo, with meaning emphasis,"speak thus of a fallen exile, what must I have felt who acknowledge asovereign?"

"Rienzi is not of Rome alone - he is of Italy - of the world," returned theSignora. "And you, Angelo, who have had the boldness to speak thus of onefallen, have proved with what loyalty you can serve those who have thefortune to own you."

As she spoke, the Signora looked at the page's downcast and blushing facelong and wistfully, with the gaze of one accustomed to read the soul in thecountenance.

"Men are often deceived," said she sadly, yet with a half smile; "but womenrarely, - save in love. Would that Rome were filled with such as you! Enough! Hark! Is that the sound of hoofs in the court below?"

"Madam," said Giacomo, bringing his mantle gallantly over his shoulder, "Isee the servitors of Monsignore the Cardinal d'Albornoz. - It is theCardinal himself."

"It is well!" said the Signora, with a brightening eye; "I await him!" With these words she withdrew by the door through which she had surprisedthe Roman page.

Chapter 7.II. The Character of a Warrior Priest - an Interview - theIntrigue and Counter-intrigue of Courts.

Giles, (or Egidio, (Egidio is the proper Italian equivalent to the Frenchname Gilles, - but the Cardinal is generally called, by the writers of thatday, Gilio d'Albornoz.)) Cardinal d'Albornoz, was one of the mostremarkable men of that remarkable time, so prodigal of genius. Boastinghis descent from the royal houses of Aragon and Leon, he had early enteredthe church, and yet almost a youth, attained the archbishopric of Toledo. But no peaceful career, however brilliant, sufficed to his ambition. Hecould not content himself with the honours of the church, unless they werethe honours of a church militant. In the war against the Moors, noSpaniard had more highly distinguished himself; and Alphonso XI. king ofCastile, had insisted on receiving from the hand of the martial priest thebadge of knighthood. After the death of Alphonso, who was stronglyattached to him, Albornoz repaired to Avignon, and obtained from ClementVI. the cardinal's hat. With Innocent he continued in high favour, andnow, constantly in the councils of the Pope, rumours of warlikepreparation, under the banners of Albornoz, for the recovery of the papaldominions from the various tyrants that usurped them, were alreadycirculated through the court. (It is a characteristic anecdote of thisbold Churchman, that Urban V. one day demanded an account of the sums spentin his military expedition against the Italian tyrants. The Cardinalpresented to the Pope a wagon, filled with the keys of the cities andfortresses he had taken. "This is my account," said he; "you perceive howI have invested your money." The Pope embraced him, and gave him nofurther trouble about his accounts.) Bold, sagacious, enterprising, andcold-hearted, - with the valour of the knight, and the cunning of thepriest, - such was the character of Giles, Cardinal d'Albornoz.

Leaving his attendant gentlemen in the antechamber, Albornoz was usheredinto the apartment of the Signora Cesarini. In person, the Cardinal wasabout the middle height; the dark complexion of Spain had faded by thought,and the wear of ambitious schemes, into a sallow but hardy hue; his browwas deeply furrowed, and though not yet passed the prime of life, Albornozmight seem to have entered age, but for the firmness of his step, theslender elasticity of his frame, and an eye which had acquired calmness anddepth from thought, without losing any of the brilliancy of youth.

"Beautiful Signora," said the Cardinal, bending over the hand of theCesarini with a grace which betokened more of the prince than of thepriest; "the commands of his Holiness have detained me, I fear, beyond thehour in which you vouchsafed to appoint my homage, but my heart has beenwith you since we parted."

"The Cardinal d'Albornoz," replied the Signora, gently withdrawing herhand, and seating herself, "has so many demands on his time, from theduties of his rank and renown, that methinks to divert his attention for afew moments to less noble thoughts is a kind of treason to his fame."

"Ah, Lady," replied the Cardinal, "never was my ambition so nobly directedas it is now. And it were a prouder lot to be at thy feet than on thethrone of St. Peter."

A momentary blush passed over the cheek of the Signora, yet it seemed theblush of indignation as much as of vanity; it was succeeded by an extremepaleness. She paused before she replied; and then fixing her large andhaughty eyes on the enamoured Spaniard, she said, in a low voice,

"My Lord Cardinal, I do not affect to misunderstand your words; neither doI place them to the account of a general gallantry. I am vain enough tobelieve you imagine you speak truly when you say you love me."

"Imagine!" echoed the Spaniard.

"Listen to me," continued the Signora. "She whom the Cardinal Albornozhonours with his love has a right to demand of him its proofs. In thepapal court, whose power like his? - I require you to exercise it for me."

"Cardinal, no! there is one thing dearer to an Italian and a woman thanwealth or station - it is revenge!"

The Cardinal drew back from the flashing eye that was bent upon him, butthe spirit of her speech touched a congenial chord.

"There," said he, after a little hesitation, "there spake high descent. Revenge is the luxury of the well-born. Let serfs and churls forgive aninjury. Proceed, Lady."

"Hast thou heard the last news from Rome?" asked the Signora.

"Surely," replied the Cardinal, in some surprise, "we were poor statesmento be ignorant of the condition of the capital of the papal dominions; andmy heart mourns for that unfortunate city. But wherefore wouldst thouquestion me of Rome? - thou art - "

"Roman! Know, my Lord, that I have a purpose in calling myself of Naples.To your discretion I intrust my secret - I am of Rome! Tell me of herstate."

"Fairest one," returned the Cardinal, "I should have known that that browand presence were not of the light Campania. My reason should have told methat they bore the stamp of the Empress of the World. The state of Rome,"continued Albornoz, in a graver tone, "is briefly told. Thou knowest thatafter the fall of the able but insolent Rienzi, Pepin, count of Minorbino,(a creature of Montreal's) who had assisted in expelling him, would havebetrayed Rome to Montreal, - but he was neither strong enough nor wiseenough, and the Barons chased him as he had chased the Tribune. Some timeafterwards a new demagogue, John Cerroni, was installed in the Capitol. Heonce more expelled the nobles; new revolutions ensued - the Barons wererecalled. The weak successor of Rienzi summoned the people to arms - invain: in terror and despair he abdicated his power, and left the city aprey to the interminable feuds of the Orsini, the Colonna, and theSavelli."

"Thus much I know, my Lord; but when his Holiness succeeded to the chair ofClement VI. - "

"Then," said Albornoz, and a slight frown darkened his sallow brow, "thencame the blacker part of the history. Two senators were elected in concertby the Pope."

"Their names?"

"Bertoldo Orsini, and one of the Colonna. A few weeks afterwards, the highprice of provisions stung the rascal stomachs of the mob - they rose, theyclamoured, they armed, they besieged the Capitol - "

"Well, well," cried the Signora, clasping her hands, and betokening inevery feature her interest in the narration.

"Colonna only escaped death by a vile disguise; Bertoldo Orsini wasstoned."

"Stoned! - there fell one!"

"Yes, lady, one of a great house; the least drop of whose blood were worthan ocean of plebeian puddle. At present, all is disorder, misrule,anarchy, at Rome. The contests of the nobles shake the city to the centre;and prince and people, wearied of so many experiments to establish agovernment, have now no governor but the fear of the sword. Such, fairmadam, is the state of Rome. Sigh not, it occupies now our care. It shallbe remedied; and I, madam, may be the happy instrument of restoring peaceto your native city."

"There is but one way of restoring peace to Rome," answered the Signora,abruptly, "and that is - The restoration of Rienzi!"

The Cardinal started. "Madam," said he, "do I hear aright? - are you notnobly born? - can you desire the rise of a plebeian? Did you not speak ofrevenge, and now you ask for mercy?"

"Lord Cardinal," said the beautiful Signora, earnestly, "I do not ask formercy: such a word is not for the lips of one who demands justice. Noblyborn I am - ay, and from a stock to whose long descent from the patriciansof ancient Rome the high line of Aragon itself would be of yesterday. Nay,I would not offend you, Monsignore; your greatness is not borrowed frompedigrees and tombstones - your greatness is your own achieving: would youspeak honestly, my Lord, you would own that you are proud only of your ownlaurels, and that, in your heart, you laugh at the stately fools who trickthemselves out in the mouldering finery of the dead!"

"Muse! prophetess! you speak aright," said the high-spirited Cardinal, withunwonted energy; "and your voice is like that of the Fame I dreamed of inmy youth. Speak on, speak ever!"

"Such," continued the Signora, "such as your pride, is the just pride ofRienzi. Proud that he is the workman of his own great renown. In such asthe Tribune of Rome we acknowledge the founders of noble lineage. Ancestrymakes not them - they make ancestry. Enough of this. I am of noble race,it is true; but my house, and those of many, have been crushed and brokenbeneath the yoke of the Orsini and Colonna - it is against them I desirerevenge. But I am better than an Italian lady - I am a Roman woman - Iweep tears of blood for the disorders of my unhappy country. I mourn thateven you, my Lord, - yes, that a barbarian, however eminent and howevergreat, should mourn for Rome. I desire to restore her fortunes."

"But Rienzi would only restore his own."

"Not so, my Lord Cardinal; not so. Ambitious and proud he may be - greatsouls are so - but he has never had one wish divorced from the welfare ofRome. But put aside all thought of his interests - it is not of these Ispeak. You desire to re-establish the papal power in Rome. Your senatorshave failed to do it. Demagogues fail - Rienzi alone can succeed; he alonecan command the turbulent passions of the Barons - he alone can sway thecapricious and fickle mob. Release, restore Rienzi, and through Rienzi thePope regains Rome!"

The Cardinal did not answer for some moments. Buried as in a revery, hesate motionless, shading his face with his hand. Perhaps he secretly ownedthere was a wiser policy in the suggestions of the Signora than he caredopenly to confess. Lifting his head, at length, from his bosom, he fixedhis eyes upon the Signora's watchful countenance, and, with a forced smile,said,

"Pardon me, madam; but while we play the politicians, forget not that I amthy adorer. Sagacious may be thy counsels, yet wherefore are they urged? Why this anxious interest for Rienzi? If by releasing him the Church maygain an ally, am I sure that Giles d'Albornoz will not raise a rival?"

"My Lord, said the Signora, half rising, "you are my suitor; but your rankdoes not tempt me - your gold cannot buy. If you love me, I have a rightto command your services to whatsoever task I would require - it is the lawof chivalry. If ever I yield to the addresses of mortal lover, it will beto the man who restores to my native land her hero and her saviour."

"Fair patriot," said the Cardinal, "your words encourage my hope, yet theyhalf damp my ambition; for fain would I desire that love and not serviceshould alone give me the treasure that I ask. But hear me, sweet lady; youover-rate my power: I cannot deliver Rienzi - he is accused of rebellion,he is excommunicated for heresy. His acquittal rests with himself."

"You can procure his trial?"

"Perhaps, Lady."

"That is his acquittal. And a private audience of his Holiness?"

"Doubtless."

"That is his restoration! Behold all I ask!"

"And then, sweet Roman, it will be mine to ask," said the Cardinal,passionately, dropping on his knee, and taking the Signora's hand. For onemoment, that proud lady felt that she was woman - she blushed, shetrembled; but it was not (could the Cardinal have read that heart) withpassion or with weakness; it was with terror and with shame. Passively shesurrendered her hand to the Cardinal, who covered it with kisses.

"Thus inspired," said Albornoz, rising, "I will not doubt of success. Tomorrow I wait on thee again."

He pressed her hand to his heart - the lady felt it not. He sighed hisfarewell - she did not hear it. Lingeringly he gazed; and slowly hedeparted. But it was some moments before, recalled to herself, the Signorafelt that she was alone.

"Alone!" she cried, half aloud, and with wild emphasis - "alone! Oh, whathave I undergone - what have I said! Unfaithful, even in thought, to him! Oh, never! never! I, that have felt the kiss of his hallowing lips - thathave slept on his kingly heart - I! - holy Mother, befriend and strengthenme!" she continued, as, weeping bitterly, she sunk upon her knees; and forsome moments she was lost in prayer. Then, rising composed, but deadlypale, and with the tears rolling heavily down her cheeks, the Signorapassed slowly to the casement; she threw it open, and bent forward; the airof the declining day came softly on her temples; it cooled, it mitigated,the fever that preyed within. Dark and huge before her frowned, in itsgloomy shadow, the tower in which Rienzi was confined; she gazed at it longand wistfully, and then, turning away, drew from the folds of her robe asmall and sharp dagger. "Let me save him for glory!" she murmured; "andthis shall save me from dishonour!"

Enamoured of the beauty, and almost equally so of the lofty spirit, of theSignora Cesarini, as was the warlike Cardinal of Spain, love with him wasnot so master a passion as that ambition of complete success in all theactive designs of life, which had hitherto animated his character andsignalized his career. Musing, as he left the Signora, on her wish for therestoration of the Roman Tribune, his experienced and profound intellectran swiftly through whatever advantages to his own political designs mightresult from that restoration. We have seen that it was the intention ofthe new Pontiff to attempt the recovery of the patrimonial territories, nowtorn from him by the gripe of able and disaffected tyrants. With thisview, a military force was already in preparation, and the Cardinal wasalready secretly nominated the chief. But the force was very inadequate tothe enterprise; and Albornoz depended much upon the moral strength of thecause in bringing recruits to his standard in his progress through theItalian states. The wonderful rise of Rienzi had excited an extraordinaryenthusiasm in his favour through all the free populations of Italy. Andthis had been yet more kindled and inflamed by the influential eloquence ofPetrarch, who, at that time, possessed of a power greater than ever, beforeor since, (not even excepting the Sage of Ferney,) wielded by a singleliterary man, had put forth his boldest genius in behalf of the RomanTribune. Such a companion as Rienzi in the camp of the Cardinal might be amagnet of attraction to the youth and enterprise of Italy. On nearingRome, he might himself judge how far it would be advisable to reinstateRienzi as a delegate of the papal power. And, in the meanwhile, theRoman's influence might be serviceable, whether to awe the rebelliousnobles or conciliate the stubborn people. On the other hand, the Cardinalwas shrewd enough to perceive that no possible good could arise fromRienzi's present confinement. With every month it excited deeper and moreuniversal sympathy. To his lonely dungeon turned half the hearts ofrepublican Italy. Literature had leagued its new and sudden, and thereforemighty and even disproportioned, power with his cause; and the Pope,without daring to be his judge, incurred the odium of being his gaoler. "Apopular prisoner," said the sagacious Cardinal to himself, "is the mostdangerous of guests. Restore him as your servant, or destroy him as yourfoe! In this case I see no alternative but acquittal or the knife!" Inthese reflections that able plotter, deep in the Machiavelism of the age,divorced the lover from the statesman.

Recurring now to the former character, he felt some disagreeable and uneasyforebodings at the earnest interest of his mistress. Fain would he haveattributed, either to some fantasy of patriotism or some purpose ofrevenge, the anxiety of the Cesarini; and there was much in her stern andhaughty character which favoured that belief. But he was forced toacknowledge to himself some jealous apprehension of a sinister and latentmotive, which touched his vanity and alarmed his love. "Howbeit," hethought, as he turned from his unwilling fear, "I can play with her at herown weapons; I can obtain the release of Rienzi, and claim my reward. Ifdenied, the hand that opened the dungeon can again rivet the chain. In heranxiety is my power!"

These thoughts the Cardinal was still revolving in his palace, when he wassuddenly summoned to attend the Pontiff.

The pontifical palace no longer exhibited the gorgeous yet graceful luxuryof Clement VI., and the sarcastic Cardinal smiled to himself at the quietgloom of the ante-chambers. "He thinks to set an example - this poornative of Limoges!" thought Albornoz; "and has but the mortification offinding himself eclipsed by the poorest bishop. He humbles himself, andfancies that the humility will be contagious."

His Holiness was seated before a small and rude table bestrewed withpapers, his face buried in his hands; the room was simply furnished, and ina small niche beside the casement was an ivory crucifix; below, the death'shead and cross-bones, which most monks then introduced with a purposesimilar to that of the ancients by the like ornaments, - mementos of theshortness of life, and therefore admonitions to make the best of it! Onthe ground lay a map of the Patrimonial Territory, with the fortresses inespecial, distinctly and prominently marked. The Pope gently lifted up hishead as the Cardinal was announced, and discovered a plain but sensible andsomewhat interesting countenance. "My son!" said he, with a kindlycourtesy to the lowly salutation of the proud Spaniard, "scarcely wouldstthou imagine, after our long conference this morning, that new cares wouldso soon demand the assistance of thy counsels. Verily, the wreath ofthorns stings sharp under the triple crown; and I sometimes long for thequiet abode of my old professor's chair in Toulouse: my station is of painand toil."

"God tempers the wind to the shorn lamb," observed the Cardinal, with piousand compassionate gravity.

Innocent could scarcely refrain a smile as he replied, "The lamb thatcarries the cross must have the strength of the lion. Since we parted, myson, I have had painful intelligence; our couriers have arrived from theCampagna - the heathen rage furiously - the force of John di Vico hasaugmented fearfully, and the most redoubted adventurer of Europe hasenlisted under his banner."

"Does his Holiness," cried the Cardinal, anxiously, "speak of Fra Moreale,the Knight of St. John?"

"Of no less a warrior," returned the Pontiff. "I dread the vast ambitionof that wild adventurer."

"Your Holiness hath cause," said the Cardinal, drily.

"Some letters of his have fallen into the hands of the servants of theChurch; they are here: read them, my son."

Albornoz received and deliberately scanned the letters; this done, hereplaced them on the table, and remained for a few moments silent andabsorbed.

"What think you, my son?" said the Pope, at length, with an impatient andeven peevish tone.

"I think that, with Montreal's hot genius and John di Vico's frigidvillany, your Holiness may live to envy, if not the quiet, at least therevenue, of the Professor's chair."

"How, Cardinal!" said the Pope, hastily, and with an angry flush on hispale brow. The Cardinal quietly proceeded.

"By these letters it seems that Montreal has written to all the commandersof free lances throughout Italy, offering the highest pay of a soldier toevery man who will join his standard, combined with the richest plunder ofa brigand. He meditates great schemes then! - I know the man!"

"Well, - and our course?"

"Is plain," said the Cardinal, loftily, and with an eye that flashed with asoldier's fire. "Not a moment is to be lost! Thy son should at once takethe field. Up with the Banner of the Church!"

"But are we strong enough? our numbers are few. Zeal slackens! the pietyof the Baldwins is no more!"

"Your Holiness knows well," said the Cardinal, "that for the multitude ofmen there are two watchwords of war - Liberty and Religion. If Religionbegins to fail, we must employ the profaner word. 'Up with the Banner ofthe Church - and down with the tyrants!' We will proclaim equal laws andfree government; (In correcting the pages of this work, in the year1847...strange coincidences between the present policy of the Roman Churchand that by which in the 14th century it recovered both spiritual andtemporal power cannot fail to suggest themselves.) and, God willing, ourcamp shall prosper better with those promises than the tents of Montrealwith the more vulgar shout of 'Pay and Rapine.'"

"Giles d'Albornoz," said the Pope, emphatically; and, warmed by the spiritof the Cardinal, he dropped the wonted etiquette of phrase, "I trustimplicitly to you. Now the right hand of the Church - hereafter, perhaps,its head. Too well I feel that the lot has fallen on a lowly place. Mysuccessor must requite my deficiencies."

No changing hue, no brightening glance, betrayed to the searching eye ofthe Pope whatever emotion these words had called up in the breast of theambitious Cardinal. He bowed his proud head humbly as he answered, "PrayHeaven that Innocent VI. may long live to guide the Church to glory. ForGiles d'Albornoz, less priest than soldier, the din of the camp, the breathof the war-steed, suggest the only aspirations which he ever dares indulge. But has your Holiness imparted to your servant all that - "

"Nay," interrupted Innocent, "I have yet intelligence equally ominous. This John di Vico, - pest go with him! - who still styles himself (theexcommunicated ruffian!) Prefect of Rome, has so filled that unhappy citywith his emissaries, that we have well-nigh lost the seat of the Apostle. Rome, long in anarchy, seems now in open rebellion. The nobles - sons ofBelial! - it is true, are once more humbled; but how? - One Baroncelli, anew demagogue, the fiercest - the most bloody that the fiend ever helped -has arisen - is invested by the mob with power, and uses it to butcher thepeople and insult the Pontiff. Wearied of the crimes of this man, (whichare not even decorated by ability,) the shout of the people day and nightalong the streets is for 'Rienzi the Tribune.'"

"Ha!" said the Cardinal, "Rienzi's faults then are forgotten in Rome, andthere is felt for him the same enthusiasm in that city as in the rest ofItaly?"

"Alas! It is so."

"It is well, I have thought of this: Rienzi can accompany my progress - "

"My son! the rebel, the heretic - "

"By your Holiness's absolution will become quiet subject and orthodoxCatholic," said Albornoz. "Men are good or bad as they suit our purpose. What matters a virtue that is useless, or a crime that is useful, to us? The army of the Church proceeds against tyrants - it proclaims everywhereto the Papal towns the restoration of their popular constitutions. Seesnot your Holiness that the acquittal of Rienzi, the popular darling, willbe hailed an earnest of your sincerity? - sees not your Holiness that hisname will fight for us? - sees not your Holiness that the great demagogueRienzi must be used to extinguish the little demagogue Baroncelli? We mustregain the Romans, whether of the city or whether in the seven towns ofJohn di Vico. When they hear Rienzi is in our camp, trust me, we shallhave a multitude of deserters from the tyrants - trust me, we shall hear nomore of Baroncelli."

"Ever sagacious," said the Pope, musingly; "it is true, we can use thisman: but with caution. His genius is formidable - "

"And therefore must be conciliated; if we acquit, we must make him ours. My experience has taught me this, when you cannot slay a demagogue by law,crush him with honours. He must be no longer Tribune of the People. Givehim the Patrician title of Senator, and he is then the Lieutenant of thePope!"

"I will see to this, my son - your suggestions please, but alarm me: heshall at least be examined; - but if found a heretic - "

"Should, I humbly advise, be declared a saint."

The Pope bent his brow for a moment, but the effort was too much for him,and after a moment's struggle, he fairly laughed aloud.

"Go to, my son," said he, affectionately patting the Cardinal's sallowcheek. "Go to. - If the world heard thee, what would it say?"

"That Giles d'Albornoz had just enough religion to remember that the Stateis a Church, but not too much to forget that the Church is a State."

With these words the conference ended. That very evening the Pope decreedthat Rienzi should be permitted the trial he had demanded.

Chapter 7.IV. The Lady and the Page.

It wanted three hours of midnight, when Albornoz, resuming his character ofgallant, despatched to the Signora Cesarini the following billet.

"Your commands are obeyed. Rienzi will receive an examination on hisfaith. It is well that he should be prepared. It may suit your purpose,as to which I am so faintly enlightened, to appear to the prisoner what youare - the obtainer of this grace. See how implicitly one noble heart cantrust another! I send by the bearer an order that will admit one of yourservitors to the prisoner's cell. Be it, if you will, your task toannounce to him the new crisis of his fate. Ah! madam, may fortune be asfavourable to me, and grant me the same intercessor - from thy lips mysentence is to come."

As Albornoz finished this epistle, he summoned his confidential attendant,a Spanish gentleman, who saw nothing in his noble birth that should preventhis fulfilling the various hests of the Cardinal.

"Alvarez," said he, "these to the Signora Cesarini by another hand; thouart unknown to her household. Repair to the state tower; this to theGovernor admits thee. Mark who is admitted to the prisoner Cola di Rienzi: Know his name, examine whence he comes. Be keen, Alvarez. Learn by whatmotive the Cesarini interests herself in the prisoner's fate. All too ofherself, birth, fortunes, lineage, would be welcome intelligence. Thoucomprehendest me? It is well. One caution - thou hast no mission from, noconnexion with, me. Thou art an officer of the prison, or of the Pope, -what thou wilt. Give me the rosary; light the lamp before the crucifix;place yon hair-shirt beneath those arms. I would have it appear as ifmeant to be hidden! Tell Gomez that the Dominican preacher is to beadmitted."

"Those friars have zeal," continued the Cardinal to himself, as, afterexecuting his orders, Alvarez withdrew. "They would burn a man - but onlyon the Bible? They are worth conciliating, if the triple crown be reallyworth the winning; were it mine, I would add the eagle's plume to it."

And plunged into the aspiring future, this bold man forgot even the objectof his passion. In real life, after a certain age, ambitious men loveindeed; but it is only as an interlude. And indeed with most men, life hasmore absorbing though not more frequent concerns than those of love. Loveis the business of the idle, but the idleness of the busy.

The Cesarini was alone when the Cardinal's messenger arrived, and he wasscarcely dismissed with a few lines, expressive of a gratitude which seemedto bear down all those guards with which the coldness of the Signorausually fenced her pride, before the page Angelo was summoned to herpresence.

The room was dark with the shades of the gathering night when the youthentered, and he discerned but dimly the outline of the Signora's statelyform; but by the tone of her voice, he perceived that she was deeplyagitated.

"Angelo," said she, as he approached, "Angelo - " and her voice failed her. She paused as for breath and again proceeded. "You alone have served usfaithfully; you alone shared our escape, our wanderings, our exile - youalone know my secret - you of my train alone are Roman! - Roman! it wasonce a great name. Angelo, the name has fallen; but it is only because thenature of the Roman Race fell first. Haughty they are, but fickle; fierce,but dastard; vehement in promise, but rotten in their faith. You are aRoman, and though I have proved your truth, your very birth makes me afraidof falsehood."

"Madam," said the page; "I was but a child when you admitted me of yourservice, and I am yet only on the verge of manhood. But boy though I yetbe, I would brave the stoutest lance of knight, or freebooter, in defenceof the faith of Angelo Villani, to his liege Lady and his native land."

"Alas! alas!" said the Signora, bitterly, "such have been the words ofthousands of thy race. What have been their deeds? But I will trust thee,as I have trusted ever. I know that thou art covetous of honour, that thouhast youth's comely and bright ambition."

"I am an orphan and a bastard," said Angelo, bluntly! "And circumstancestings me sharply on to action; I would win my own name."

"Thou shalt," said the Signora. "We shall live yet to reward thee. Andnow be quick. Bring hither one of thy page's suits, - mantle and head-gear. Quick, I say, and whisper not to a soul what I have asked of thee."

Chapter 7.V. The Inmate of the Tower.

The night slowly advanced, and in the highest chamber of that dark andrugged tower which fronted the windows of the Cesarini's palace sate asolitary prisoner. A single lamp burned before him on a table of stone,and threw its rays over an open Bible; and those stern but fantasticlegends of the prowess of ancient Rome, which the genius of Livy hasdignified into history. ("Avea libri assai, suo Tito Livio, sue storie diRoma, la Bibbia et altri libri assai, non finava di studiare." - "Vita diCola di Rienzi", lib. ii. cap. 13. See translation to motto to Book VII.page 202.) A chain hung pendent from the vault of the tower, and confinedthe captive; but so as to leave his limbs at sufficient liberty to measureat will the greater part of the cell. Green and damp were the mightystones of the walls, and through a narrow aperture, high out of reach, camethe moonlight, and slept in long shadow over the rude floor. A bed at onecorner completed the furniture of the room. Such for months had been theabode of the conqueror of the haughtiest Barons, and the luxurious dictatorof the stateliest city of the world!

Care, and travel, and time, and adversity, had wrought their change in theperson of Rienzi. The proportions of his frame had enlarged from thecompact strength of earlier manhood, the clear paleness of his cheek wasbespread with a hectic and deceitful glow. Even in his present studies,intent as they seemed, and genial though the lecture to a mind enthusiasticeven to fanaticism, his eyes could not rivet themselves as of yore steadilyto the page. The charm was gone from the letters. Every now and then hemoved restlessly, started, re-settled himself, and muttered brokenexclamations like a man in an anxious dream. Anon, his gaze impatientlyturned upward, about, around, and there was a strange and wandering fire inthose large deep eyes, which might have thrilled the beholder with a vagueand unaccountable awe.

Angelo had in the main correctly narrated the more recent adventures ofRienzi after his fall. He had first with Nina and Angelo betaken himselfto Naples, and found a fallacious and brief favour with Louis, king ofHungary; that harsh but honourable monarch had refused to yield hisillustrious guest to the demands of Clement, but had plainly declared hisinability to shelter him in safety. Maintaining secret intercourse withhis partisans at Rome, the fugitive then sought a refuge with the Eremites,sequestered in the lone recesses of the Monte Maiella, where in solitudeand thought he had passed a whole year, save the time consumed in his visitto and return from Florence. Taking advantage of the Jubilee in Rome, hehad then, disguised as a pilgrim, traversed the vales and mountains stillrich in the melancholy ruins of ancient Rome, and entering the city, hisrestless and ambitious spirit indulged in new but vain conspiracies! (Rainald, Ann. 1350, N. 4, E. 5.) Excommunicated a second time by theCardinal di Ceccano, and again a fugitive, he shook the dust from his feetas he left the city, and raising his hands towards those walls, in whichare yet traced the witness of the Tarquins, cried aloud - "Honoured as thyprince - persecuted as thy victim - Rome, Rome, thou shalt yet receive meas thy conqueror!"

Still disguised as a pilgrim, he passed unmolested through Italy into theCourt of the Emperor Charles of Bohemia, where the page, who had probablywitnessed, had rightly narrated, his reception. It is doubtful, however,whether the conduct of the Emperor had been as chivalrous as appears byAngelo's relation, or whether he had not delivered Rienzi to the Pontiff'semissaries. At all events it is certain, that from Prague to Avignon, thepath of the fallen Tribune had been as one triumph. His strange adventures- his unbroken spirit - the new power that Intellect daily and wonderfullyexcited over the minds of the rising generation - the eloquence ofPetrarch, and the common sympathy of the vulgar for fallen greatness, - allconspired to make Rienzi the hero of the age. Not a town through which hepassed which would not have risked a siege for his protection - not a housethat would not have sheltered him - not a hand that would not have struckin his defence. Refusing all offers of aid, disdaining all occasion ofescape, inspired by his indomitable hope, and his unalloyed belief in thebrightness of his own destinies, the Tribune sought Avignon - and found adungeon!

These, his external adventures, are briefly and easily told; but who shalltell what passed within? - who narrate the fearful history of the heart? -who paint the rapid changes of emotion and of thought - the indignant grief- the stern dejection - the haughty disappointment that saddened while itnever destroyed the resolve of that great soul? Who can say what must havebeen endured, what meditated, in the hermitage of Maiella; - on the lonelyhills of the perished empire it had been his dream to restore; - in theCourts of Barbarian Kings; - and above all, on returning obscure anddisguised, amidst the crowds of the Christian world, to the seat of hisformer power? What elements of memory, and in what a wild and fiery brain! What reflections to be conned in the dungeons of Avignon, by a man who hadpushed into all the fervour of fanaticism - four passions, a single one ofwhich has, in excess, sufficed to wreck the strongest reason - passions,which in themselves it is most difficult to combine, - the dreamer - theaspirant - the very nympholept of Freedom, yet of Power - of Knowledge, yetof Religion!

"Ay," muttered the prisoner, "ay, these texts are comforting - comforting. The righteous are not alway oppressed." With a long sigh he deliberatelyput aside the Bible, kissed it with great reverence, remained silent, andmusing for some minutes; and then as a slight noise was heard at one cornerof the cell, said softly, "Ah, my friends, my comrades, the rats! it istheir hour - I am glad I put aside the bread for them!" His eye brightenedas it now detected those strange and unsocial animals venturing forththrough a hole in the wall, and, darkening the moonshine on the floor,steal fearlessly towards him. He flung some fragments of bread to them,and for some moments watched their gambols with a smile. "Manchino, thewhite-faced rascal! he beats all the rest - ha, ha! he is a superior wretch- he commands the tribe, and will venture the first into the trap. Howwill he bite against the steel, the fine fellow! while all the ignoblerherd will gaze at him afar off, and quake and fear, and never help. Yet ifunited, they might gnaw the trap and release their leader! Ah, ye are basevermin, ye eat my bread, yet if death came upon me, ye would riot on mycarcass. Away!" and clapping his hands, the chain round him clankedharshly, and the noisome co-mates of his dungeon vanished in an instant.

That singular and eccentric humour which marked Rienzi, and which hadseemed a buffoonery to the stolid sullenness of the Roman nobles, stillretained its old expression in his countenance, and he laughed loud as hesaw the vermin hurry back to their hiding-place.

"A little noise and the clank of a chain - fie, how ye imitate mankind!" Again he sank into silence, and then heavily and listlessly drawing towardshim the animated tales of Livy, said, "An hour to midnight! - waking dreamsare better than sleep. Well, history tells us how men have risen - ay, andnations too - after sadder falls than that of Rienzi or of Rome!"

In a few minutes, he was apparently absorbed in the lecture; so intentindeed, was he in the task, that he did not hear the steps which wound thespiral stairs that conducted to his cell, and it was not till the wardsharshly grated beneath the huge key, and the door creaked on its hinges,that Rienzi, in amaze at intrusion at so unwonted an hour, lifted his eyes. The door had reclosed on the dungeon, and by the lonely and pale lamp hebeheld a figure leaning, as for support, against the wall. The figure waswrapped from head to foot in the long cloak of the day, which, aided by abroad hat, shaded by plumes, concealed even the features of the visitor.

Rienzi gazed long and wistfully.

"Speak," he said at length, putting his hand to his brow. "Methinks eitherlong solitude has bewildered me, or, sweet sir, your apparition dazzles. Iknow you not - am I sure? - " and Rienzi's hair bristled while he slowlyrose - "Am I sure that it is living man who stands before me? Angels haveentered the prison-house before now. Alas! an angel's comfort never wasmore needed."

The stranger answered not, but the captive saw that his heart heaved evenbeneath his cloak; loud sobs choked his voice; at length, as by a violenteffort, he sprung forward, and sunk at the Tribune's feet. The disguisinghat, the long mantle fell to the ground - it was the face of a woman thatlooked upward through passionate and glazing tears - the arms of a womanthat clasped the prisoner's knees! Rienzi gazed mute and motionless asstone. "Powers and Saints of Heaven!" he murmured at last, "do ye tempt mefurther! - is it? - no, no - yet speak!"

"Beloved - adored! - do you not know me?"

"It is - it is!" shrieked Rienzi wildly, "it is my Nina - my wife - my - "His voice forsook him. Clasped in each other's arms, the unfortunates forsome moments seemed to have lost even the sense of delight at theirreunion. It was as an unconscious and deep trance, through which somethinglike a dream only faintly and indistinctively stirs.

At length recovered - at length restored, the first broken exclamations,the first wild caresses of joy over - Nina lifted her head from herhusband's bosom, and gazed sadly on his countenance - "Oh, what thou hastknown since we parted! - what, since that hour when, borne on by thy boldheart and wild destiny, thou didst leave me in the Imperial Court, to seekagain the diadem and find the chain! Ah! why did I heed thy commands? -why suffer thee to depart alone? How often in thy progress hitherward, indoubt, in danger, might this bosom have been thy resting-place, and thisvoice have whispered comfort to thy soul? Thou art well, my Lord - myCola! Thy pulse beats quicker than of old - thy brow is furrowed. Ah!tell me thou art well!"

"Well,' said Rienzi, mechanically. "Methinks so! - the mind diseasedblunts all sense of bodily decay. Well - yes! And thou - thou, at least,art not changed, save to maturer beauty. The glory of the laurel-wreathhas not faded from thy brow. Thou shalt yet - " then breaking off abruptly- "Rome - tell me of Rome! And thou - how camest thou hither? Ah! perhapsmy doom is sealed, and in their mercy they have vouchsafed that I shouldsee thee once more before the deathsman blinds me. I remember, it is thegrace vouchsafed to malefactors. When I was a lord of life and death, Itoo permitted the meanest criminal to say farewell to those he loved."

"No - not so, Cola!" exclaimed Nina, putting her hand before his mouth. "Ibring thee more auspicious tidings. Tomorrow thou art to be heard. Thefavour of the Court is propitiated. Thou wilt be acquitted."

"Ha! speak again."

"Thou wilt be heard, my Cola - thou must be acquitted!"

"And Rome be free! - Great God, I thank Thee!"

The Tribune sank on his knees, and never had his heart, in his youngest andpurest hour, poured forth thanksgiving more fervent, yet less selfish. When he rose again, the whole man seemed changed. His eye had resumed itsearlier expressions of deep and serene command. Majesty sate upon hisbrow. The sorrows of the exile were forgotten. In his sanguine and rapidthoughts, he stood once more the guardian of his country, - and itssovereign!

Nina gazed upon him with that intense and devoted worship, which steepedher vainer and her harder qualities in all the fondness of the softestwoman. "Such," thought she, "was his look eight years ago, when he left mymaiden chamber, full of the mighty schemes which liberated Rome - such hislook, when at the dawning sun he towered amidst the crouching Barons, andthe kneeling population of the city he had made his throne!"

"Yes, Nina!" said Rienzi, as he turned and caught her eye. "My soul tellsme that my hour is at hand. If they try me openly, they dare not convict -if they acquit me, they dare not but restore. Tomorrow, saidst thou,tomorrow?"

"Chance, Cola!" said Nina, with reproachful tenderness. "Could I know thatthou wert in the dungeons of the Pontiff, and linger in idle security atPrague? Even at the Emperor's Court thou hadst thy partisans andfavourers. Gold was easily procured. I repaired to Florence - disguisedmy name - and came hither to plot, to scheme, to win thy liberty, or to diewith thee. Ah! did not thy heart tell thee that morning and night the eyesof thy faithful Nina gazed upon this gloomy tower; and that one friend,humble though she be, never could forsake thee!"

"Sweet Nina! Yet - yet - at Avignon power yields not to beauty withoutreward. Remember, there is a worse death than the pause of life."

"Woman," said the Tribune, sternly; "thy lips elude the answer I wouldseek. In our degenerate time and land, thy sex and ours forget too baselywhat foulness writes a leprosy in the smallest stain upon a matron'shonour. That thy heart would never wrong me, I believe; but if thyweakness, thy fear of my death should wrong me, thou art a bitterer foe toRienzi than the swords of the Colonna. Nina, speak!"

"Oh, that my soul could speak," answered Nina. "Thy words are music to me,and not a thought of mine but echoes them. Could I touch this hand, couldI meet that eye, and not know that death were dearer to thee than shame? Rienzi, when last we parted, in sadness, yet in hope, what were thy wordsto me?"

"I remember them well," returned the Tribune: "'I leave thee,' I said, 'tokeep alive at the Emperor's Court, by thy genius, the Great Cause. Thouhast youth and beauty - and courts have lawless and ruffian suitors. Igive thee no caution; it were beneath thee and me. But I leave thee thepower of death.' And with that, Nina - "

"Thy hands tremblingly placed in mine this dagger. I live - need I saymore?"

"My noble and beloved Nina, it is enough. Keep the dagger yet."

"Yes; till we meet in the Capitol of Rome!"

A slight tap was heard at the door; Nina regained, in an instant, herdisguise.

"It is on the stroke of midnight," said the gaoler, appearing at thethreshold.

"I come," said Nina.

"And thou hast to prepare thy thoughts," she whispered to Rienzi: "arm allthy glorious intellect. Alas! is it again we part? How my heart sinks!"

The presence of the gaoler at the threshold broke the bitterness of partingby abridging it. The false page pressed her lips on the prisoner's hand,and left the cell.

The gaoler, lingering behind for a moment, placed a parchment on the table.It was the summons from the court appointed for the trial of the Tribune.

"At another time," answered the false Angelo, drawing the cloak closerround her face; it is late - I am hurried."

"Nay," said the Spaniard, "you escape me not so easily;" and he caught firmhold of the page's shoulder.

"Unhand me, sir!" said Nina, haughtily, and almost weeping, for her strongnerves were yet unstrung. "Gaoler, at thy peril - unbar the gates."

"So hot," said Alvarez, surprised at so great a waste of dignity in a page;"nay, I meant not to offend thee. May I wait on thy pageship tomorrow?"

"Ay, tomorrow," said Nina, eager to escape.

"And meanwhile," said Alvarez, "I will accompany thee home - we can conferby the way."

So saying, without regarding the protestations of the supposed page, hepassed with Nina into the open air. "Your lady," said he, carelessly, "iswondrous fair; her lightest will is law to the greatest noble of Avignon. Methinks she is of Naples - is it so? Art thou dumb, sweet youth?"

The page did not answer, but with a step so rapid that it almost put theslow Spaniard out of breath, hastened along the narrow space between thetower and the palace of the Signora Cesarini, nor could all the efforts ofAlvarez draw forth a single syllable from his reluctant companion, tillthey reached the gates of the palace, and he found himself discourteouslyleft without the walls.

"A plague on the boy!" said he, biting his lips; "if the Cardinal thrive aswell as his servant, by're Lady, Monsignore is a happy man!"

By no means pleased with the prospect of an interview with Albornoz, who,like most able men, valued the talents of those he employed exactly inproportion to their success, the Spaniard slowly returned home. With thelicence accorded to him, he entered the Cardinal's chamber somewhatabruptly, and perceived him in earnest conversation with a Cavalier, whoselong moustache, curled upward, and the bright cuirass worn underneath hismantle, seemed to betoken him of martial profession. Pleased with therespite, Alvarez hastily withdrew: and, in fact, the Cardinal's thoughtsat that moment, and for that night, were bent upon other subjects thanthose of love.

The interruption served, however, to shorten the conversation betweenAlbornoz and his guest. The latter rose.

"I think," said he, buckling on a short and broad rapier, which he laidaside during the interview, - "I think, my Lord Cardinal, you encourage meto consider that our negotiation stands a fair chance of a prosperousclose. Ten thousand florins, and my brother quits Viterbo, and launchesthe thunderbolt of the Company on the lands of Rimini. On your part - "

"On my part it is agreed," said the Cardinal, "that the army of the Churchinterferes not with the course of your brother's arms - there is peacebetween us. One warrior understands another!"

"And the word of Giles d'Albornoz, son of the royal race of Arragon, is aguarantee for the faith of a Cardinal," replied the Cavalier, with a smile. "It is, my Lord, in your former quality that we treat."

"There is my right hand," answered Albornoz, too politic to heed theinsinuation. The Cavalier raised it respectfully to his lips, and hisarmed tread was soon heard descending the stairs.

With that he rose hastily, deposited his papers in an iron chest, andopening a concealed door behind the arras, entered a chamber that ratherresembled a monk's cell than the apartment of a prince. Over a mean pallethung a sword, a dagger, and a rude image of the Virgin. Without summoningAlvarez, the Cardinal unrobed, and in a few moments was asleep.

The next day at early noon the Cavalier, whom our last chapter presented tothe reader, was seen mounted on a strong Norman horse, winding his wayslowly along a green and pleasant path some miles from Avignon. At lengthhe found himself in a wild and romantic valley, through which wandered thatdelightful river whose name the verse of Petrarch has given to so beloved afame. Sheltered by rocks, and in this part winding through the greenestbanks, enamelled with a thousand wild flowers and water-weeds, went thecrystal Sorgia. Advancing farther, the landscape assumed a more sombre andsterile aspect. The valley seemed enclosed or shut in by fantastic rocksof a thousand shapes, down which dashed and glittered a thousand rivulets. And, in the very wildest of the scene, the ground suddenly opened into aquaint and cultivated garden, through which, amidst a profusion of foliage,was seen a small and lonely mansion, - the hermitage of the place. Thehorseman was in the valley of the Vaucluse; and before his eye lay thegarden and the house of PETRARCH! Carelessly, however, his eye scanned theconsecrated spot; and unconsciously it rested, for a moment, upon asolitary figure seated musingly by the margin of the river. A large dog atthe side of the noonday idler barked at the horseman as he rode on. "Abrave animal and a deep bay!" thought the traveller; to him the dog seemedan object much more interesting than its master. And so, - as the crowd oflittle men pass unheeding and unmoved, those in whom Posterity shallacknowledge the landmarks of their age, - the horseman turned his glancefrom the Poet!

Thrice blessed name! Immortal Florentine! (I need scarcely say that it ishis origin, not his actual birth, which entitles us to term Petrarch aFlorentine.) not as the lover, nor even as the poet, do I bow before thyconsecrated memory - venerating thee as one it were sacrilege to introducein this unworthy page - save by name and as a shadow; but as the first whoever asserted to people and to prince the august majesty of Letters; whoclaimed to Genius the prerogative to influence states, to control opinion,to hold an empire over the hearts of men, and prepare events by animatingpassion, and guiding thought! What, (though but feebly felt and dimlyseen) - what do we yet owe to Thee if Knowledge be now a Power; if MIND bea Prophet and a Fate, foretelling and foredooming the things to come! Fromthe greatest to the least of us, to whom the pen is at once a sceptre and asword, the low-born Florentine has been the arch-messenger to smooth theway and prepare the welcome. Yes! even the meanest of the aftercomers -even he who now vents his gratitude, - is thine everlasting debtor! Thine,how largely is the honour, if his labours, humble though they be, find anaudience wherever literature is known; preaching in remotest lands themoral of forgotten revolutions, and scattering in the palace and themarketplace the seeds that shall ripen into fruit when the hand of thesower shall be dust, and his very name, perhaps, be lost! For few, alas!are they, whose names may outlive the grave; but the thoughts of every manwho writes, are made undying; - others appropriate, advance, exalt them;and millions of minds unknown, undreamt of, are required to produce theimmortality of one!

Indulging meditations very different from those which the idea of Petrarchawakens in a later time, the Cavalier pursued his path.

The valley was long left behind, and the way grew more and more faintlytraced, until it terminated in a wood, through whose tangled boughs thesunlight broke playfully. At length, the wood opened into a wide glade,from which rose a precipitous ascent, crowned with the ruins of an oldcastle. The traveller dismounted, led his horse up the ascent, and,gaining the ruins, left his steed within one of the roofless chambers,overgrown with the longest grass and a profusion of wild shrubs; thenceascending, with some toil, a narrow and broken staircase, he found himselfin a small room, less decayed than the rest, of which the roof and floorwere yet whole.

Stretched on the ground in his cloak, and leaning his head thoughtfully onhis hand, was a man of tall stature, and middle age. He lifted himself onhis arm with great alacrity as the Cavalier entered.

Brettone drew from beneath his cloak a sufficiently huge flask of wine, anda small panier, tolerably well filled; the inmate of the tower threwhimself upon the provant with great devotion. And both the soldiers, forsuch they were, stretched at length on the ground, regaled themselves withconsiderable zest, talking hastily and familiarly between every mouthful.

"I say, Brettone, thou playest unfairly; thou hast already devoured morethan half the pasty: push it hitherward. And so the Cardinal consents! What manner of man is he? Able as they say?"

"Quick, sharp, and earnest, with an eye of fire, few words, and comes tothe point."

"Unlike a priest then; - a good brigand spoilt. What hast thou heard ofthe force he heads? Ho, not so fast with the wine."

"Scanty at present. - He relies on recruits throughout Italy."

"What his designs for Rome? There, my brother, there tends my secret soul! As for these petty towns and petty tyrants, I care not how they fall, or bywhom. But the Pope must not return to Rome. Rome must be mine. The cityof a new empire, the conquest of a new Attila! There, every circumstancecombines in my favour! - the absence of the Pope, the weakness of themiddle class, the poverty of the populace, the imbecile though ferociousbarbarism of the Barons, have long concurred to render Rome the mostfacile, while the most glorious conquest!"

"My brother, pray Heaven your ambition do not wreck you at last; you areever losing sight of the land. Surely with the immense wealth we areacquiring, we may - "

"Aspire to be something greater than Free Companions, generals today, andadventurers tomorrow. Rememberest thou, how the Norman sword won Sicily,and how the bastard William converted on the field of Hastings his batoninto a sceptre. I tell thee, Brettone, that this loose Italy has crowns onthe hedge that a dexterous hand may carry off at the point of the lance.